In the Company of My Skin
by shoutgraffiti
Summary: Stray with me? NaruIno.


IN THE WAKE OF UCHIHA SASUKE'S DEATH, everyone's gotten so goddamn emotional even Neji can't stand it. But I don't care - not really, not at all, because I've never given a second thought to anything other than my hair or Sasuke's ass - and we're all trapped in shadows, aren't we, Shikamaru? 

Shikamaru gives me a blank look, but doesn't shove me away - too lazy, this guy. His eyes aren't bloodshot, but they're expressionless when they look at the bottle of liquor I'm punctuating my dialogue with.

Don't you think she's being selfish? I say, sing, because my voice is liquid sex and don't we all know there's nothing else to it - she's being selfish, crying all to herself over it, and I'm crying too. I'm crying because I loved him too.

Yeah, you're crying, Shikamaru confirms. He's smoking again, and I hate him smoking, that's Asuma-sensei's thing, that's Asuma-sensei smoking even if he's dead -

I drink some more, take a few moments, and repeat, I loved him too.

He doesn't confirm that and now I hate him even more; too smart, too sharp, and where's that leave me but leaving, and taking the bottle with me.

He doesn't stop smoking to stop me and that's fine because my inhibitions are taking the night off too; though I'd like to blame both, it's really all my own fault. When'd everything start sprouting from further away, when'd I start needing Shikamaru to hold me still till I could catch up to myself? When did I never, though, when have I ever caught up to...

Whatever, it works, I tell myself, over and over because I'm good for lies - in more ways than one, they say. Shikamaru's just as messed up over this, isn't he - his face is blank save for the guilt that's made its blanket over it ever since we heard. Maybe if he'd succeeded that first mission, he's probably thinking - analyzing, running the mistakes through his head so often that they fray from edge-side in - and it's not your fault, I want to say, it's not anyone's fault but Sasuke's.

It hadn't been a pleasant way to find out, now that I'm on the subject, and I'm stumbling just thinking about that dumb face Naruto was pulling - dumber than usual and making me sick, because maybe Sakura wasn't the only one relying on that promise of his. Sakura-chan, I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

I don't think we were supposed to have heard and it's not the sort of gossip that I'd be into - gossip was me and Sakura, and I'm crying harder, because I can already tell that soon, the only sort of news that's worth whispering to be who died, how and why.

There's a commotion somewhere outside as I'm passing the bridge that team seven always met at, back before they fell apart, and while I'm not surprised that Naruto's moping around here, it is a surprise to see the Hokage herself moping by his side. She's got one hand on his head, ruffling at his hair, looking for all the world as if she's just finished yelling at him and about to start crying for him because it's all she can do. All I can do is stop there and stand, stupid, staring and thinking that nothing's ever going to get fixed around here if we all don't just...

I want to carve his name on the memorial, Naruto's saying, looking like he's shaking - not nearly as well as I do on the dance floor - even as Tsunade's rubbing at his temples and shaking her head no, No, we can't have that, laws are laws and I know you're going to break them, so let's just save you the red tape and I'll do that myself. He looks surprised but nods, feverishly, as if Tsunade's compliance means more than his own - and I can't help but be feverish, myself, at the implications of how highly he respects the Hokage and how highly she respects him.

I walk away, because leaving was what I'd set out to do and I figure that I shouldn't cheat the next day's drama lest it get nearly so loose an occurrence as me, when I'm a little more sober and a lot less lost on exactly what it is I feel has gone wrong.

* * *

WHILE IN ATTENDANCE OF UCHIHA SASUKE'S NOT-FUNERAL - because traitors aren't honored like that, because the traitor's the one that abandoned you and you're supposed go just as low, honey - I manage to sober up at the look on Sakura's face if not at anything else. 

Hey, Forehead, I say, lamely and hanging onto something we had before not-having him, we're all going to get wrinkles if you keep that face up much longer. I ignore that it's been less than a day since it all happened, because moments between us without him at the center have always been that much more meaningful, that much more painful.

Which means she must be hurting badly without him at the center of their moments, because she and me and she and them didn't always mesh nearly so well. Her boys and her best friend - it was a girl's complex to trust their girls to take care of themselves and to trust their boys not to. I understand this, I see this clear and well; for all Shikamaru's genius and for all Chouji's calm, I need them to need me and it's only in that I find myself. What is the point? What is the point?

She turns to me and cries into my shoulder, and I tug her hair gently even as she sobs harder. Don't you cry for the all of us, because that's selfish, I tell her, you cry for yourself and leave our tears alone. We don't waste tears on each other as long as we're still breathing, and we don't waste tears on each other when we're dead.

She understands the difference between hope and despair better than I understand the difference in it and all of us - she's stiff against me, eyes bruised but the burdens on her shoulders easing. I know she's thinking about her boys, about how one of them always knew and how the other will never learn - that she's tired, so tired, and done.

We begin to leave, but this time there are no liquor bottles involved and isn't that just a pity. I glance over who's still left, to see what pieces remain lodged in whose hearts, and find Naruto watching, eyes almost grey but whispering to say what no one's have to me on behalf of my relationship to Sakura: thank you for taking care of her. I frown and turn away, because only a perpetual orphan who was best friends with Uchiha Sasuke could imagine every instance of the bond being so inordinately intertwined with rivalry, blood and vengeance.

That's sad, I think, the most tragic thing of all, because Sasuke was probably the center of most of Naruto's moments, too.

* * *

THREE MONTHS AFTER UCHIHA SASUKE'S DEATH, guess who walks into the flower shop but the wonder of blunders himself. Uzumaki Naruto looks no better than he did the last I saw him - but that's nothing new, is it - and the heat of the summer showers have left the blond's hair matted to his head, not unlike I'd imagine his hair would be after... 

When he was younger I'd remember looking over at him and thinking He looks like an old cat! Half-drowned sack of skin and bones! and it was clever of me until I got clever enough to wonder where he'd get his food, when we were six and I'd have mom and dad and he'd watch us all go from that rickety swing of his.

He nods vaguely in my direction, eyes shifted aside to the pre-prepped bouquets, then the carnations, chrysanthemums, gardenia... hibiscus and holly, primrose and poppy, before stopping at the roses and sage and asking me so faintly that I fairly flail to hear, Do any of these mean pity... or regret? He's fingering the edges of his coat, fixing his eyes on the bouquets by the window. Do any of those say that I'm glad...?

And I fill in the blanks, I fill in the I'm glad you're dead and I don't think I'm sorry anymore. I'm taken aback at that thought of Is that what you really mean to say? Or is it, and we've all blanked on something in this - because of course we know what day it is, me and him and Sakura and Kakashi-sensei. There are things that the rest of us could never understand about Sasuke and Naruto, Naruto and Sasuke, an ad lib none of us have tried playing.

But it's not my place to place anything in that capacity, and shinobi have come in before asking for the very same thing. There're plenty of those, I tell him nonchalantly, coming around the other side of the register and plucking flowers as I go. It's a formula, these; and no one knows better than me to prove my math wrong. I'm reaching for a few yellow hyacinths when Naruto's gaze focuses and he shakes his head, Not those.

I blink, begin to ask Well if you know what you want, why aren't you - and stop, because I realize that there are times you'd rather others say things for you. I've said a lot of things for others - said, done - their hands tugging through my hair and crooning all sorts of things - I'd rather never have in the first place. This is me. This is my job.

Just so, I continue putting words into his mouth through the selections I make, imagining what a walk through his mind would give voice to: rage, grief, rivalry, rue. I wonder which of these are true?

You need to go see Forehead, I say instead of asking, she's been upset that you haven't been to see her. Thinks you blame yourself or something.

He doesn't respond, but it's unnecessary: he's zoning out and touching that blue crystal he wears around his neck, looking as gentle and jaded as Sandaime ever did, and I stiffen at the association. All those years of his shouting about it must have rubbed off on me, and I can't help but dislike that he's plenty steps closer to his dream while I'm plenty steps off from mine - jogging its circumference backwards, spiraling from a goal so vague that I'm not sure I can see its origin in the distance.

* * *

IN THE MONTHS FOLLOWING UCHIHA SASUKE'S BIRTHDAY, Naruto begins to come outside to sit with the rest of us more often, whenever we have time between missions. Shikamaru looks at easy once again, despite the roughened fringe to the round of his slouch, and the creases around Sakura's eyes and forehead are fading smooth. Sai's cyclic attempts to either feed Naruto or insult his manhood undergo rapidfire rotations, while Kiba goes loud enough to make up for the all of us. Naruto doesn't realize how much they worry for him. 

And between berating Chouji his habits, I wonder what Naruto means to me.

...Nothing. A comrade of Konoha, and potentially it's future leader, but little else. I'm not like the rest of these guys - he's never suffered my pain, and I haven't suffered his. The only things we have in common are that we both love Sakura, we both loved Sasuke, and we're both blonde.

But there's something gentle I see in him that reminds me of Chouji watching his mother make him his lunch, something as jagged as the grin Shikamaru wears as he moves around his shougi board, and something that reminds me a little bit of me, in the way his loose hair shrouds his eyes as he smiles for the camera.

Sakura's smiling along with him - no hint of the bitter taste I tend to grace my missions with - and there's a fine line again between wanting to be a part of her world as opposed to his; but where did that come from, I wonder, because it's not like me to have standards. And here's a thought I'd not have stooped to in my academy days: would Naruto be a step up?

I sip my water and taste the lemonade on his tongue a couple hours later, after being the-only-one-left and turning on him when he is least expecting it - not that he'd ever have expected it. He pushes me away, gently, forgetting that I have breasts and wincing madly as he retracts his hands from them.

I smile coolly, and he gathers enough of his wits to ask, What the hell'ttebayo?

I laugh wildly and tug him close again, tug an earlobe with my teeth and tell him I'm willing.

I don't see his face but the way his body tenses a few moments later tells me he's come upon the rinds of my duties and me. There's a moment that I feel him trembling - or is that me, wobbling - and a deep breath: Ino-chan, can we talk for moment?

* * *

GLITZY, RITZY - that's us in a nutshell, peas in a princess' pod seared open and tripping. Uchiha Sasuke's deathday comes around and I go by Naruto's apartment to find him seated across a cake, handmade and precious, because it tastes pretty good for the breadth of foul sentiments implied with it. 

I never understand what you mean to say about Sasuke, I say, dipping a finger into the icing and tasting it as tentatively as I phrase my questions. You're glad he's dead on his birthday and celebrating his death? Some best friend forever. is too harsh, so instead she asks, Why celebrate today and not his birthday?

Naruto doesn't answer for several long moments, eyes closed and brows tilted in a way that scalds me for having wondered Did he ever want Saskue dead? And then he tells me: Why celebrate his birth into the clan that ended up imprisoning him - why not celebrate the day he freed himself of that?

Sakura wonders about our sex life, and there's - surprisingly - absolutely nothing to tell. We tell everyone we're together the day after he shows me the plants around his apartment, before which he's purged enough of the truth from me to maybe conjure some sort of understanding of it all. It gives him an excuse to save someone else, gives me the excuse to have someone's eyes on me - in a good way.

Most things about Naruto are in a good way.

And every time someone's eyes are on me - in a bad way - I do what I need to do as I did before - nothing changes this. Naruto does not change this, cannot, and I'm vaguely aware that I like lording the fact over his head. I don't think I'm good for him.

I don't think I'm good for you, I say aloud, bringing the mood further down even as he gets up to take a slice of cake for himself. He says nothing, so I purr, You won't let me be good to you.

It doesn't have too many calories, he replies as he slides a piece toward me. I look at the cake, look at him, consider how disgruntled he might get if I let him know that Oh, thanks for your concern, but I get enough exercise to eat the entire cake without gaining a thing - he'd probably offer to make several more.

I settle on Thanks. My mouth is full and we're quiet; I'm having fun imagining all the perverted things Naruto would nosebleed over if he knew I was thinking them, before he says that I'll support you as long as you need me to, Ino-chan. And even when you don't.

Idiot. Idiot idiot idiot. I don't need him to help the mission up to the forefront of my mind .

* * *

WE'RE IN THE FLOWER SHOP, and a year later the routine has fit so firm I've forgotten what it was I saw in Uchiha Sasuke in the first place. I try imagining my prince in shining armor now, and all I can see is a man in armor chipped, gray and fraying as he creeps to the edges of my mind's eye. 

Tsunade-baa-chan's told me that she's announced me to the council and I've been selected for Rokudaime, Naruto tells me in one big exhalation, sitting behind the bleeding hearts and watching me defensively.

I laugh, because it's what you do when you're glad, right? - and he slowly debunks his guard, blooming into the same soft smile I've let vine up my features. What can I say save for I totally saw that coming, with or without my Shintenshin.

He gets up and holds his arms out, slightly, waiting - and it's so endearing, because it's not like he's ever needed permission to touch me - and we share a moment - quiet, banterless, because I'm proud and he's relieved I'm not anything but.

And I'm not sure when it became something other than mutual complexes being excised on the other, but I decide I've grown comfortable enough with him to stay with him.

You don't love me, he says, after I tell him that, when he's grown into his office and Konoha's grown with him.

No, probably not.

He pushes his hat aside and surveys me over the clasp of his fingers, surveys and polls and gathers together whatever statistics I may mean to him. It's been three years, I remind myself now, three years since I kissed him and asked him if he'd not save me like he'd saved the others, but help me hold my head above the watermark so as not to get my pretty features gritty.

That I trusted him, for whatever it was worth. Not having his hand to hold would leave me...

As spontaneously as the way I initiated our relationship, I'm sitting on his lap and pushing my hands through the layers of his robes to grab onto that crystal necklace of his hanging low against his chest, sloppy and asking him Please, please... There's some stumbling, but he tells me that I'm not leaving you unless you ask me to. I steep in those words, as he grins his eyes shut, jokes about You may as well add me to your list of admirers, Ino-chan.

Sakura tells me he's loved me since I asked him to tell me about his mother, a few months into our relationship. What, I demand, that makes no sense.

Hey, I never claimed to know how that idiot's mind works, Sakura replies, on one of our girls night outs and we're sitting at our usual cafe stirring over teas and tarts. But he's completely convinced that if he stays with you long enough, you'll love him back too.

Ridiculous, I scoff, angry because the dumb tactic is working.

-おわり-

* * *

**Disclaimer:** Naruto isn't mine. 

**Notes:** Just playing around with style. Would appreciate concrit :)


End file.
